The water sector in Senegal is one of
the most developed in Sub-Saharan Africa. Access to water in
urban areas is almost universal, but sanitation lags behind.
The ... Show More +government's urban sanitation strategy calls for
the development of on-site solutions at municipal level. The
Output-Based Aid (OBA) Senegal project linked payments to
the installation of adequate sanitation facilities in
households. Lessons learned during project implementation
include: 1) a demand-based and flexible approach is key to
triggering and sustaining user uptake; 2) drawing on
experience and pursuing creative approaches can help
overcome challenges; 3) sustaining project benefits requires
strong ownership by beneficiaries, and complementary actions
downstream on the value chain; 4) well-designed subsidy
structures can leverage limited public and private
resources; and 5) top-level commitment is essential to
improve municipal sanitary conditions at scale. Show Less -

DR. KIM: Well, thanks, everyone, for coming by. I just finished a trip to the Sahel with the Secretary-General, which was our second trip. And I'll talk about that in a bit. Al... Show More +so, just back from meeting with the Pope, which we can also talk about if you'd like. And my first visit to Turkey.But I want to start off by just, first of all, expressing our deepest condolences to the people of the Philippines. We've been, of course, watching this very carefully. We've got many projects going with them. We're not part of the group of first responders. And so, we're not on the ground now, doing immediate humanitarian relief. That's not what we do. But we've made it clear to the authorities in the Philippines that we'd be prepared to be involved in any way that they find appropriate. We already have, for example, conditional cash transfer programs, where we're providing direct resources to poor people. And we could increase the speed and the volume, remove the conditions; there's all kinds of things we can do. And we're in the middle of a discussion with them right now.You know, we've had a tremendous amount of experience responding to disasters. For example, we were responsible for a good deal of the removal of the debris in Haiti. And so, it's one possibility in the future, if that's what they need.So, while not being first responders, we're very involved. But I think it's important for the world to reflect on what we're seeing. Now, the critical issue is that you cannot connect any single event to climate change. That's not the point. But if you look across the world, the Philippines, quite literally, lives in the eye of the storm. So many storms are passing through the Philippines. The directions of the storms coming at the Philippines are changing now. And so, you can't think about building resilience on just one part of a particular island. So, they're in a particularly difficult situation.I was in a meeting with President Aquino, and we were talking about climate change. And he stood up, and he said, "Look, if anyone doubts the reality of climate change, please just come to the Philippines." If you think of the number of storms that have hit over the past year, the severity of those storms, and then if you look back, and you think about--so, we had Sandy last year, then we had Phailin in India, another category 5, that hit landfall, and then, now, Haiyan, or Yolanda as they refer to it in the Philippines, the second major storm in a year. The point is to think back and say, "What are the trends in the world?" So, I just got back from the Sahel. And droughts that used to happen every five to ten years now are happening regularly, reliably, every two to three years. In the Horn of Africa, severe droughts that happened, before, once in every 20 years are now happening every five years.So, it's not so much that a single event is the issue. The real event is that the frequency of these events are increasing. And that's exactly what the climate change scientists have predicted. Now, can you assign any of the current damage--well, you know, there were 20-foot waves and, you know, 10 to 15-foot rise in water levels. And we know that water levels, from historic records, have gone up about seven and a half inches, so a small portion. But again, that's not the point. The point is it's happening over, and over, and over again.But an even more important point is that the world agrees a lot on the things that we need to do right now. Everyone agrees that at some point, if we can find a stable price on carbon, that that would be good for everybody. China right now is engaging in a very extensive carbon-trading scheme inside China. The experience of a price on carbon has not been the most positive experience, but still, I think leaders across the world know that moving toward some sort of stable price in carbon would be important. That's the hardest one. That's going to be the hardest one to get to. But there's so many other things we can do right now that will have huge impact that pretty much everybody agrees on.Now, one that the IMF and Christine Lagarde has really championed is the removal of fossil-fuel subsidies. Critically important, into the trillions of dollars, the amount that governments spend in fossil-fuel subsidies, they don't really help the poor, they pollute the environment, and the removal of fossil-fuel subsidies could then make available government funds to support many other, much more important priorities. But it's politically difficult. So, again, it's something that people agree on but politically difficult to enact in any country.*But then you go to the issue of sustainable energy. Everyone agrees that we have to move toward more renewable sources of energy. And nowhere is this more clear, and the possibilities greater in my view, than places like the Sahel, like in Sub-Saharan Africa. So, more investment in renewable energy, cleaner sources of energy, everyone agrees we can do that now.Cleaner, more livable cities, everyone agrees that the way that cities are being built right now can be improved in terms of reducing the carbon footprint and making the cities livable. We're doing a major project right now with China to really work with them to rethink in a fundamental way how they're building their cities. Now, 60 to 70 percent of all carbon emissions come from cities. So, if we can build cleaner, more livable cities, with greater concentration, with mass transit, with using cleaner sources of energy to provide the base load electricity. There's so much we can do.And then, the final issue, and again, it's just a no-brainer, is climate-smart agriculture. And climate-smart agriculture, very specifically, means the simplest kinds of interventions that have been shown to have tremendous impact. For example, in Costa Rica, if you look, the whole country is moving toward climate-smart agriculture. So, instead of cutting down trees to make fences, they're actually planting trees, and then stringing barbed wire between living trees to define their property. And what happens is that those trees not only keep their livestock within the bounds, but they actually fix nitrogen and put it back in the soil, increasing the yield. So, there are, right now, things that we can do. We had a huge project in Kenya, a climate-smart agriculture project, that we know we can take to scale all over the world. And it will both take more carbon and put it in the ground, it will preserve the river beds, it will increase the yield and increase profits for farmers.These are all things that we can do right now. And so, what I hope the tragedy in the Philippines helps us to do is to move away from having, what I think, a silly argument about, not really the science, but about science as a whole. Ninety-five percent of climate scientists agree that anthropogenic climate change is real and that we've got to do something about it, or the impacts are going to be severe. So, basically, if you argue with those findings, you're not really arguing against climate change, because there's just no science to support you. You're arguing against science. And I guess you can do that. And I guess you can argue that you don't trust science. But I do. And I think it's really important that we should respond to the evidence as we see it. Moreover, I just want to make the point that there's just so many things we can do right now. Let's stop the argument. Let's move forward. Let's get the agreement. Let's make the investments that we need.In the Sahel, you know, I'm just returning, and I have to say that it was different than what I expected, in the sense that the conditions, the living conditions, were just as difficult as I expected. But the things that had been accomplished there are really quite stunning, given the difficulty of the circumstances. Let me just give you an example. Burkina Faso has grown their economy; their growth rate is going to be over 6 percent this year. They've continued to grow. They've built a lot of infrastructure, especially in Ouagadougou. But they've done it paying 74 cents a kilowatt hour for electricity. So, they import all their electricity from Côte d'Ivoire, and 74 cents a kilowatt hour is about seven times the global average. Here, in DC, we pay probably nine to 10 cents. A very high rate would be 25 to 30 cents a kilowatt hour. Burkina Faso pays 74 cents. So, the fact that they were able to see the growth that they have seen while still paying such high prices for energy is really quite remarkable.The other thing I saw was that there is tremendous support for French intervention--and Jeremy, especially, I want to make this clear--tremendous support for the French intervention in the Sahel, and for interesting reasons. You know, when I visited with President Compaoré of Burkina Faso, he told me about the history that they have of cavalries, that they were able to build a cavalry before anyone else in the region was able to. And he thinks that that was critical in their ability, over centuries, to repel the intrusion of Islamic extremism. And they see this latest set of events as just part of a centuries-long quest to live in harmony with a diverse group of people, Christians, Muslims, we had Arab populations, Tuareg, I met with them all when I was in Timbuktu. And they quite literally said, "What's happening, this Islamic extremism, is not part of the culture of the Sahel." And so, you know, I think some people in France have been saying, "Is this going to be France's Afghanistan?" And I can tell you that, from what I saw, overwhelmingly the answer is no, because the population as a whole so strongly supports the effort to keep out Islamic extremism from that area.Now, you know, what they're going to have to do is reduce the trade barriers between the Sahelian countries and really act like an economic bloc. And they're committed to doing that. But, you know, again, in countries like that, all along the borders, they have all kinds of ways of slowing down trade that we're going to try to help them to fix. But I came away from this visit unexpectedly, extremely optimistic about what could be done. If we can lower the prices of energy, if we can get them to work as an economic zone, with very fluid trade barriers, if we can attract the kind of foreign direct investment that I think right now that they could make very good use of, then the prospects for growth and development in that region, I think, are very high. And I think the intervention of the French, to ensure that Islamic extremism was kept at bay, at least for now, was an important intervention, and it's going to help us make progress.So, let me just start with those two, right off the top of my head, those two issues, which is Africa and climate change related to what we're seeing in the Philippines, and then just open it up for any questions that you might have.REUTERS: Just as a quick follow-up, what do you make of current climate talks and kind of where we are in the dialogue today?DR. KIM: There's a session happening right now in Warsaw and we're getting, of course, updates on a regular basis and my understanding is that yesterday, at the opening, a lot of the focus was on what was happening in the Philippines and, I'm sure you know, the representative for the climate talks to the Philippines is now on a hunger strike until something happens. Now, what I hope happens is that rather than just focusing on what is legally binding and what is not, that we make a major commitment to doing the things that we know we can do right now. I mentioned it. Price on carbon, removing fuel subsidies, sustainable energy, cities and climate-smart agriculture, they're five things that we can all move on right now and it doesn't require any kind of major legally-binding agreements. So, we are certainly injecting that kind of sensibility into the discussions. The Secretary-General has very much embraced those five points in his own approach to climate change. We really hope we can reach legally-binding agreements in 2015 in Paris. This is going to be a very important moment. But we can't be in a situation where everyone is waiting for those agreements to happen and then declare our efforts at fighting climate change a failure if they don't. We've got to move right now to tackle those issues we can take--In the Philippines a huge part of what they need to do is to build up resilience. And it's so hard to do, because in the U.S., you've got a coastline but islands, the coastline surrounds them and they've got multiple islands and because the storms are now coming from different directions, how do you build up resilience? So we've begun to do some studies on just what it's going to cost to build up resilience to storms of this magnitude, and they are very, very significant costs. Now, what we do know, though, is that right now the cost of these major storms on coastlines is about $6 billion a year. But by 2050, if all the predictions come true about the increasing frequency of these storms and the severity of these storms, then the costs will be around, in inflation-adjusted dollars, about a trillion dollars a year. REUTERS: By 2050?DR. KIM: By 2050. And, of course, they're going to increase every year between now and 2050. But our own estimate is that if we spend about $50 billion a year on building resilience, that we could actually avoid the vast majority of those costs. By building in resilience. And we know how to do it. In New York City they're doing it right now, they're building various levees and barriers in using both the natural systems and built-up systems, you know, artificially built-up systems, to protect the city from another Sandy. It's going to be very expensive, but compared to what it will cost if we don't do it? We think it's a good investment. DPA: But what about the finance, what about the $100 billion target by 2020? DR. KIM: You know, the Green Climate Fund is about to open. I'm going to be in Korea on December 5th. We have our climate investment funds here. And there have been many, many pledges. Donor governments have been extremely generous in terms of their pledges. I think what everyone is waiting for are really clear actionable plans where the money can be invested, there's going to be direct action and we're going to see things happening. So, let me just give you an example. One of the things that we're focusing on here at the World Bank Group is to develop bankable projects for sustainable energy. And by that we mean, look, in Burkina Faso the opportunity is huge. If we can get a public-private partnership where the government makes certain guarantees that we can also provide things like political risk insurance, we can provide some of our own investment, but then if we bring the private sector in, the private sector can make money. The returns are going to be sort of steady long-term returns. But we could potentially have the impact of dramatically increasing Burkina Faso's electrical supply, so increasing access for the people of Burkina Faso, while at the same time making money for the private sector that invests in these projects and at the same time reducing the cost per kilowatt hour. So, there are projects like this everywhere and we're focusing--if we all wait for the donations to come through, I think we'll be wasting time. So, the pledges are important, we want people to commit to the Green Climate Fund, we want them to move quickly on it. In the meantime, we at the World Bank feel that there are ways of bringing private sector money in which can move much more quickly and, in the long term, we think is more sustainable. So, public-private partnership that reduces the risk of these investments and even places like the Sahel, that will reduce the cost, increase the access and make money for companies, I think the key for us right now is to find as many of those projects as we can and move on pushing those forward. AFP: Actually I have a question that really doesn't relate to the World Bank activity but it was that we bought things that the Obama administration [unclear] stop eavesdropping on the World Bank and the IMF headquarters? I was just wondering if you have any comment on that?MR. DONNELLY: No, we're not commenting on that.DR. KIM: No, no comment. No comment on that.QUESTION: Okay. Too bad.FINANCIAL TIMES: I just have a question, back to climate change. Last month the U.S. said that it wouldn't back new coal projects. Isn't there a case to--not do coal projects at all by the Bank and how is the Bank shifting its own priorities in response? DR. KIM: Our policy's very similar on that. That we will not do any coal projects unless there are absolutely no other options in poor countries. So, we're looking around right now, and let me just give you an example: Liberia. Liberia has a total of about 21-22 megawatts of installed capacity. So, if you think about one kilowatt of installed capacity per person, it has enough energy for about 1 percent of its population. And 20 megawatts of installed capacity will give you as much energy as Texas Stadium, the stadium of the Dallas Cowboys, uses in a single day. So, it's almost nothing. And you're looking around and in Liberia, the question is what's going to be possible in that country? Now we're going to look like crazy to be able to find low-carbon renewable sources of energy supply. But in a place where they really don't have any other options, we would consider coal. But for the most part we're going to avoid coal altogether. And I have been very surprised by how much the quality has improved, in terms of providing solar energy, and the cost has gone down. So we now have some projects that are able to deliver solar power through solar-based micro-grids, not huge grids but the small grids, for local communities at around 10 cents per kilowatt hour. So, just compare that to what we're doing in Burkina Faso at 75 cents a kilowatt hour. The possibilities of solar and, in some places, wind, geothermal, hydroelectric power, are enormous and we're going to do everything we can to invest in those kinds of resources. But, for us, it's conceivable that there may be certain places where if there are no other options, we would consider coal. REUTERS: Just as a follow-up, besides Kosovo, is there any other coal plants in the pipeline or...DR. KIM: Not that I know of, not that I know of.BlOOMBERG: A separate question. If you could give us an update on the infrastructure fund. It was sort of announced and now we don't know whether [unclear] people willing to contribute. And just a quick second question: A few months--weeks ago when--your speech at George Washington, you told us that you'd be ready to abandon small projects to focus on big ones. Have you done any of that? Have you abandoned some projects? Concretely, how does that [unclear]?DR. KIM: Yeah, so--what was the first question?MR. DONNELLY: Infrastructure.DR. KIM: Infrastructure, okay.So, we wanted to do a little bit of a test. We wanted to find out what the interest would be in an infrastructure fund. And essentially, it's a new kind of product. And the idea would be that developing countries--really, any government that would want to could put money into a facility. And then, we would go out and we would bring bankable projects to the table. And we would then invite the private sector to come in and participate in projects like, for example, energy in Burkina Faso, right, energy in Nigeria, energy in any number of places. And we brought representatives of the private industry, private sector, and also representatives of governments. The demand among governments is really high. The fundamental insight is that, even at times of very low interest rates when quantitative easing was making access to capital seemingly very easy, there was still a problem getting access to capital for infrastructure in emerging markets in developing countries.So, the BRICS countries talk about a $4.5 trillion infrastructure deficit over the next five years. And if you look at total ODA, which is about 125 billion, there's no way that ODA can even touch those kinds of needs and India says that they have a trillion over the next five years themselves, and they can only imagine about half of that being covered by public sector and aid. So, and how is that other 50 percent going to be brought on board?So, what we heard, especially from the private sector, is that there's a lot of capital sitting on the sidelines earning very low interest rates. They would very much like to get involved in these kinds of infrastructure projects, but they need us to help de-risk them. That's not the perfect word but, in other words, they need us to be able to go in and, based on our 60-plus years of experience doing projects in these countries, knowing the governments, and also knowing the private sector, to come in and be able to say, "Here's a project. Here are the risks. Here's how we are going to mitigate those risks. Here's the insurance through MIGA, the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, that we can provide. And here are some examples of projects that we have done where we have done just that." And we've got a bunch of projects we'd be happy to share with you--you know, power projects in Kenya--where IFC made a direct investment, MIGA provided guarantees. The Bank, through IDA and IBRD have given guarantees in support of the government, and all the institutions together have made projects happen that actually make money for people.So, there's a huge demand for us to do it. Now, as in all sort of global facilities, the governance is tricky. So, we're trying to figure out right now exactly how it's going to be governed, but the thing that was most surprising to us was just how eager private sector investors, sovereign wealth fund managers, pension fund managers were, to make these kinds of investments. Because they're not really seeing other kinds of investments where over 10, 15, 20 years, they can make, you know, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10 percent return in a reliable way.We think a lot of these energy projects and also, for example, ports and airports and transportation projects could actually not only be critical for the development of these poor countries, but could make money for people.And at the end of the day, if we want to achieve our goals of ending poverty and boosting shared prosperity, there's just no way we're going to do it based on ODA alone. ODA is only $125 billion a year. It's a drop in the bucket. It's really important and, in fact, it becomes even more important because the demands are so huge now, but using official development assistance to bring in private money, bring in sovereign wealth fund pension fund money is going to be a key to development in the future. And so, the global infrastructure, certainly, we think is a critical part of that. Now, over time, over the next six months to a year, we'll have talked about governance, and I hope that we'll be ready to go because, boy, all the BRICS countries are very much ready to go, and to our great--what's the right word?--we were very pleased to hear of just how much the private sector is ready to go.And what was the second question, John?MR. DONNELLY: The abandoning of small projects to focus on big ones.DR. KIM: Yeah. So, if you look at the Sahel, we came to the table and we put on the table $1.5 billion extra dollars in regional projects, focused on things like hydroelectric power, on irrigation, on improving farming for the pastoralists, you know, literally bringing veterinary science for the first time to some of these pastoral communities. And so, what we did was we reprioritized. We actually moved money for Africa from smaller projects and--you know, these projects never saw the light of day, so I can't tell you what they were. But we actually moved the money around and instead of doing smaller projects in individual countries, we brought it all together and put on the table an additional $1.5 billion for major regional projects that we think will have an impact on the economy. It's precisely what we meant, and Africa's really leading the way and showing us how we're going to do that.WALL STREET JOURNAL: Just wondering, following up on infrastructure, you know, the needs of the BRIC countries are so large. You mentioned the trillion in India. I used to be based in Moscow, certainly they need a lot of infrastructure. And part of the concern there was always that, among bankers, if you put too much money in any one country, there's the "Russia" risk or the "eighty-year" risk. How does that affect you guys or how does that affect the investors who would--would they be willing to put enough money into one country to make a difference, considering the risks?DR. KIM: This is precisely why the private sector folks came to us. So (inaudible) of BlackRock, you know, the largest institutional investor--they came to us because what they're saying is, "We want you guys to do this precisely because you can hedge risk across--literally, 140 countries."So, we have something called the Asset Management Corporation where different funds can put money directly into this corporation and then, based on what they want to invest in, or if they just want to invest across multiple projects, we're able to do that because we're actively in so many places at once. And so, one of the beauties of the global investment facilities is that you can make general investments and, again, hedge across multiple countries and, by doing that, you know, we--our own record in terms of--through IFC of our equity investments over the last 15 years has been very, very good. We've been at about 20 percent a year across the board, even through the difficult time starting in 2008. And the reason we think we've been doing well, there's a lot of--one, we have the best AAA rating around. You know, our borrowing costs are something like LIBOR minus 25-30 basis points at any given time. We have a very strong AAA. Every project in the developing countries wants us to be one of the first investors, because if we're on board, then it makes it very easy for them to get other investors on board. And also, we've done so well because we've been able to hedge our investments across many, many different countries. And the hope is that all of that experience put together and the ability to hedge across different countries will make the private sector more willing to invest along with us or a facility like this where literally bets are hedged, as opposed to going into one country and making a direct investment into a single country.I think most investors would like to have the World Bank as an intermediary to help them to stave off those risks, and we think we can do it. WALL STREET JOURNAL: So, you wouldn't charge too much into on--into one country or group of countries, [unclear]--DR. KIM: Yeah. I mean, the whole point of it would be to work across many, many different countries at the same time so that, you know, a--the default or the problems of a single country wouldn’t blow up this whole facility. The whole point of it is just provide stability across the board. But I think what you'd also get from us is you'll get our own team working very hard to identify exactly what the political risks are, what the health of the banking sector, what the demand is going to look like. We are pretty good at doing that and partly because we've been at it for so long, so much longer than most folks. I mean, we've been in emerging markets from the beginning, as opposed to many who are coming into it relatively knew.AP: If it's on infrastructure, go ahead. BLOOMBERG: [Unclear]--just to know who the Bank--be they as an intermediary purely or will you putting your own money--DR. KIM: Oh, we put our own money, too. That's been one of the ways that we actually have been able to make projects go, is that we've put some of our own money on the line. Go ahead.AP: You mentioned low inflation and quantitative easing. I wonder if we could go into your view on the state of the world economy. It seems like we're sort of stuck in a rut and nobody seems to be able to get that boost to growth and [unclear] everyone is talking about.DR. KIM: So, I think the first insight is that if you look back nine months, a year, we now have the U.S., Europe, and Japan, all three are growing. Now, think back to the last time we could actually say that. It's been a very long time since you could say that all three of those have been growing at the same time.Now, you know, are there concerns? Absolutely. And we were just in France at a meeting, the economically focused international financial institutions met with President Hollande, with myself, Christine Lagarde, Guy Ryder of ILO, Angel Gurría of OECD, and Roberto Azevedo of the World Trade Organization, we just sat and had a discussion on these issues. So, you know, are there problems in Europe? Yes, there still are. I mean, there's this huge task of the Banking Union that has to be implemented. Some of the countries seem to be bouncing back, the UK seems to be growing, both Greece and Portugal look like they're about to be able to complete their programs and pay back the funds that they received during the worst of the crises. So, there are some positive signs, but there is still a lot of work to be done. Consolidation seems to be slowing down. The hope, of course, is that there will be no other Cyprus-like disasters.But you know, I think that, from my own personal view, is that in Europe, the combination of the European Central Bank, the European Union, IMF, have done a great job. I mean, they've done a great job and they've been willing to tackle really difficult problems, and everyone wishes that they would have tackled--solved these problems even more quickly than they have, but you know, I came into this job in July of 2012, and people said to me with great confidence that Greece will be out of the euro very soon, that the euro's future is in doubt, that all this is going to blow apart, and here we are, you know, now 18 months, 16 months later in a much better position than anyone had predicted that we'd be in when I started this job. So, there are some positives, but there is a lot of tough work ahead. Now, you know, we follow the U.S. economy very closely, of course, but mostly because of its impact in developing world economies. Growth is higher than has been expected, 2.8 percent instead of 2.0. Not quite sure where that growth has been coming from, but our sense is that we avoided some really bad things happening. I mean, we got very close to default, but it's very important that we didn't go there. Now, we're all very hopeful that they can resolve this crisis in--you know, come to some sort of agreement in January and February. We watched carefully, because the last time we had a near miss in August of 2011, borrowing costs for developing countries went up about 75 basis points, so, you know, three-quarters of a percent, and stock markets were depressed, on average, about 15 percent in developing countries. And those effects lasted for more than six months. So, any kind of uncertainty here in the United States has this very strong impact in the developing world. And what I was saying through the crisis, and it happened right at our Annual Meetings was that these kinds of impacts in developing countries are not good for the U.S. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has said that more than 50 percent of all exports go to developing countries. And so, these kinds of impacts in developing countries slowing down their economies has a direct impact on exports in the United States.So, it's very connected. You know, our own overall projections for growth--you'll hear different ones form different sources, and our own, just to give you a sense of the comparison--so, our own sense is that the U.S. economy will grow about, overall, 2 percent this year, 2.8 percent in 2014, and 3 percent. We're a little higher than the IMF for 2014, a little lower than the IMF for 2015, but the good news is that we think the growth will continue. We had a very good jobs report just this past week. Other--the economy seems to be, here, in good shape.Now, in terms of developing country economies, there was a lot of concern that there was a slowdown, especially in the first half of the year in China, but those numbers seem to have rebounded and China did better in Q3, and they're just finishing up their Party Congress. And I--the language coming out of the Party Congress, I think is extremely positive. They're saying that they're going to get much more--rely much more heavily on the private sector and that the distribution of resources is going to be determined much more by market forces. I think what you're seeing in China is that what they're trying to do in Shanghai--the Shanghai Free Trade Zone--is a model for what I think they're going to continue to do. And they stated all along that, even with lower growth rates, they're going to commit to making the transition from being mostly investment and export-oriented to consumption and service-oriented. And I think, for us, it's very encouraging that, despite lower growth numbers, they're continuing down the path of reforms. Their commitment to reforms of the business environment and the role of the private sector, you know, focusing on consumption more, that commitment to reform seems very, very solid. And we expect them to perhaps grow at a slower rate, but the quality of growth we think will be better. The other countries that have been affected by the announcement of the potential tapering of QE, especially countries like Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia, what we saw there was perhaps a quicker out flow of capital based on real weaknesses in those economies: Current account deficits, fiscal deficits were relatively higher. And the announcement of the curtailing of the tapering of QE really had an impact on those economies. We think we've seen about a third of the overall increase in interest rates, responding to that first announcement. But what that means is when QE tapering actually happens, interest rates will continue to go up, and that could cause problems for the emerging market economies, which is why this Global Infrastructure Facility is so important, because as U.S. interest rates go up, what we're going to see is that it will be even more difficult to get access to the kinds of capital for infrastructure investments that developing economies need. And so, we think the pressure for us or some other group or some coalition of groups to put some kind of infrastructure facility together will be even higher. MR. DONNELLY: Just a few more minutes. REUTERS: As a quick follow-up, you visited Turkey recently, and Turkey--does it, I mean, borrow money from the World Bank, as well, to help support it? If you could give us some more details about that. DR. KIM: You know, Turkey is our second largest borrower over the years. So, Turkey has done some things just incredibly well. I mean, their ability to develop infrastructure in Turkey has been really quite stunning. Roads, electricity, they've done incredibly well over the past 11 years. And some of the data coming out of there were stunning to me. I couldn't even believe it when I first heard it, that not only has their economy grown over the last 11 years since they took over, but you have to remember that when they took over--when that government--when President [Prime Minister] Erdogan's government took over, their borrowing costs were 66 percent. I mean, they were in huge trouble, 12 percent budget deficits. And so, they were in a situation of almost having to default, and that discussion was on the table, and where they are now is really quite impressive. And as a physician, the most impressive thing was that they actually built a health care system that focused more on prevention and primary care than on hospital care which almost every other middle-income country is doing, right? I mean, every other middle-income country I see is succumbing to the temptation to build fancy, shiny hospitals, which of course are driving up their health care costs. The Turks said to me, "Our health care reform made patients very happy and doctors very mad." And as a medical doctor, I can tell you that's exactly what you want to hear when you hear talk about health system reform. So, they actually decreased their infant mortality rate by two-thirds. They decreased their maternal mortality rate. They increased their life expectancy. They did things that you never would expect to see in such a short period of time by quite literally taking the advice of us and many others and doing the right things in terms of their infrastructure investment. So, Turkey continues to work with us. They don't need our money so much anymore, but the reason they continue to work with us is because they really feel that they've benefitted from our knowledge, and the quality of our knowledge is what we're really focusing on, here. You know, it's my view that the future of the World Bank is going to depend on how well we capture, curate, organize knowledge and provide it to countries so they can actually implement it in their own situations. And so, we did that very well for Turkey, and all of the changes that we're going through right now inside the organization are focused on improving the quality of our knowledge so that we can do the right thing. And now that Turkey has actually done this and shown unbelievable changes in just these basic vital statistics, who's living and who's dying, the Turkish example is one that we're going to now take to many other countries in the world. All of the BRICS need to really look hard at the Turkish health care system example, because it's both saving them money and dramatically improving their outcomes. NEW YORK TIMES: [Unclear] obviously are quite broad-based. The benefits of your major infrastructure investments are quite narrow. Can they really offset the losses [unclear]?DR. KIM: Well, the--I'm not--say it again.NEW YORK TIMES: You had said one reason your infrastructure fund is important is it will offset some of the damage that is likely to be done as QE is pulled back and as interest rates rise. The benefits of low interest rates stretch out to small businesses and individual borrowers, they're very broad based. DR. KIM: Right.NEW YORK TIMES: The benefits of investment in a new power plant are quite narrowly focused, [unclear], and long term. DR. KIM: Right.NEW YORK TIMES: I don't entirely understand how it will offset those losses.DR. KIM: What we would say is, no matter what, the high interest rates are going to affect everybody. They're going to have an impact, whatever we do. The impact of the higher interest rates will be there. The question is, will you have higher interest rates and also very high energy prices, or will you have high interest rates and lower energy prices because we've been able to make the kinds of investments we need to make in much lower cost energy for places like Nigeria, Burkina Faso, places that are playing huge sums of money for electricity.Just to give you a very specific example, I was in Senegal and we were involved with the French Government--excuse me, the French company Eiffage, they're called, in building the very first toll road in Sub-Saharan Africa outside of South Africa.Now, when we started, the evidence was all very clear that this could have an impact, but there were all kinds of objections that they can't do it. "A toll road in Senegal? Are you crazy?" So, we built it. And it has decreased the commuting time by two-thirds, and it cost $3.00 to go from one end of the toll road to the other, which seems like a high amount, but they've got exactly the number of cars that they thought were going to be on-road are on that road. And the impact of having that toll road has decreased traffic on the traditional roads so that even on those roads the transit time has decreased by two-thirds. So, the company is making money, the government provided guarantees and made--and land, et cetera. We made an investment, the company made an investment, and the impact on the development of Senegal, I think, is going to be dramatic. Already, they're saying, if you can decrease your commuting time by two-thirds, then people can actually live further away from the city center and you don't have the kind of congestion that you normally would in that city. So, the interest rates are going to have an impact anyway. Going into a high interest rate environment with better infrastructure is a much better idea than going into it without access to good infrastructure.MR. DONNELLY: We have to wrap it up, I'm sorry. Thanks, everyone, for coming. Again, we hope to do this more frequently. Show Less -

DR. KIM: [Interpreted from French.] Mr. President of the Republic, Ministers, ladies and gentlemen, it's a great honor for me and the World Bank Group to welcome the President of the Republic on... Show More + our Paris premises this morning. I would first like to express my most sincere condolences to the families of Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon, the two journalists who were killed in Mali last week.I would also like to express my solidarity and my respect towards the journalists who risked their lives every day in order to voice--to express their voice and, without their work, they would not be heard.My emotion when I met the French military was particularly strong, because, endangering their lives, they took part in the liberation of the northern part of Mali that I was visiting.The relationship between France and the World Bank dates back more than 60 years. You were one of the founding members of our institution and, in 1947, you were one of the very first countries to have the benefit of a loan from the World Bank. This was the post-war period, and you were reconstructing your country.And today, it is the very first time that we have the privilege of welcoming the head of the French state.Mr. President, your longstanding support for the subregion is a source of inspiration and motivation. The relevant interventions of your representatives within our institution have also enabled us to better grasp the very close links between the security and development.This visit has enabled me to have a better idea of the challenges that face the population and the heads of Sahel and be even more convinced that, if we work together, we can give sustainable solutions to the problems--the experiences of the population. I shall be going back to Washington full of hope and optimism. If I may, I would now like to speak English.DR. KIM: [Speaking English.] France has played an extremely important role in raising international awareness of the challenges facing the Sahel Region. I'm particularly honored to have had this opportunity to meet with President Hollande today.I briefed him on the visit to the Sahel that I undertook with the UN Secretary-General, the African Union Commission Chair, the European Commissioner for development, and the President of the African Development Bank.This trip, which was an unprecedented joint mission, led by the Secretary-General, allowed us to engage on the important and related issues of peace, security, and development, with the leaders of Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, and Chad.One of the conclusions we drew from our visit is the need for a coordinated and regional approach to tackling the major development challenges of the Region.During the trip, the World Bank Group committed $1.5 billion in new regional investments over the next two years. This is in addition to significant existing country programs. These additional funds will support major regional development priorities, such as social safety nets to help families withstand the worst effects of economic adversity and disasters.It will also allow us to invest in the infrastructure needed to spur growth and stability. We pledge to increase our work in pastoralism and irrigation in order to boost agricultural productivity and create opportunities in rural areas. The social and economic empowerment of women will be an important and integral part of our work. We need to harness the energies of all citizens, especially women, to build a secure and prosperous future for the Region.The World Bank Group's funding will create more hydropower and other sources of clean energy to greatly expand irrigation and transform agriculture, protect and expand pastoralism for more than 80 million people living in the Sahel who rely on it as a major source of food and livelihoods, expand health services for women and girls, and improve regional communications and connectivity between countries.Our package also includes $300 million from the IFC, the Bank's private sector arm, to finance the private sector development needed to create good jobs and help bring stability to the Region.Our scaled up commitment to the Sahel is made possible by the support of all our donors that come together to support the poorest countries under our fund for the poorest, IDA. IDA's rare international coalition bringing together developed countries, emerging markets, and developing countries in support of the development, priorities, and plans of low-income countries. We very much appreciate France's commitment to international solidarity and its support of IDA.The people of the Sahel have struggled too long with too little economic growth. They’ve endured a harsh climate and periods of famine. They have suffered the intricately linked curses of high fertility rates and the world's highest number of maternal and child deaths. But this is not their preordained fate.For too long we have failed the Sahel and maintained aspirations for it that reflect our inability to see past the very real challenges. The people of the Sahel do not have low aspirations for themselves.When I was in Timbuktu a few days ago, a diverse group of people all had the same message: They want just what all of us want, a good job, a good education, access to quality health care, and hope for a better life for their children.Those of us in the international community must raise our aspirations for the Region and redouble and our efforts to demonstrate our solidarity through effective, pragmatic support.Mr. President, your personal commitment to this Region has ignited great hope, and we must now follow through and keep our promises to the people of the Sahel. Under your leadership, France has played a critical role in bringing stability to most of Mali, which has helped the entire Region, and I heard thanks from every single leader in the entire Region to the work that France has been doing.The World Bank Group and France share a commonality of purpose. We also welcome your emphasis on the link between the Sahel and the Maghreb, a link to which we also attach great importance.As I assured President Hollande this morning, the World Bank Group looks forward to working in partnership and cooperation with France, and benefitting from its tremendous technical expertise and long history of engagement and investment.[Interpreted from French.] Thank you, Mr. President and thank you for everything you are doing for the Sahel population.PRESIDENT HOLLANDE: [Interpreted from French.] Mr. President of the World Bank, ladies and gentlemen, first of, I would like to thank President Kim for his welcome. It's the first time a President of the French Republic comes to the Headquarters of the World Bank in Paris, even though that was not the most difficult place to wait--was not really far away.And so, I did want to reach that goal as quickly as possible. But if I'm here, together with the ministers who came with me, it is because the action of the World Bank is very dear to me, the way it acts, its willingness to ensure the development of some of the poorest Regions in the world.And today, it is about the Sahel. It is very right to talk about the Sahel for security reasons. The Sahel is, amongst others, Mali, where France, in the name of the international community, intervened in order to allow this country to recover its territorial integrity.The Sahel still suffers from terrorist actions, and I would like to thank you, Mr. President, for mentioning the murder of the two French journalists. But I do not forget, either, that in Niger, unfortunately, there is a terrible tragedy. We discovered dozens of corpses of migrants who died in terrible circumstances. If we want the Sahel to move away from what today is underdevelopment, but if we also want to eradicate trafficking, drug trafficking, arms trafficking, trafficking of human beings, we must lead a policy that is truly a multilateral development policy for that Region of Africa, and this is what you have undertaken with our full support.Indeed, the World Bank has decided to allocate for over two years $1 billion to regional projects, for these six countries of the Sahel Region, Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Mauritania, and Chad.These projects, if they are properly implemented, will enable us to either support or create some new infrastructure, give access to water, health, and therefore enable the people who live in the Sahel to regain hope and trust.It is both a matter of economic development and justice. It is also a matter of security and these goals are linked. In December, France will host all of the leaders of Africa. The meeting will be dedicated to three topics. The first one is security: how to make sure that the Africans themselves can enjoy their defense--in particular, defend themselves against terrorism through regional forces that can be supported. And this is the responsibility of both the international community and therefore the Secretary-General of the United Nations will attend. It is also the responsibility of Europe, that will be represented by both Mr. Barroso and Mr. Van Rompuy.The second element is tackling climate change, because it is also, or mainly, impacting the Regions of desert, because we know that the situation can worsen unless there is an action at the international level. It is also France's responsibility, given that we will be hosting in 2015 the climate conference. So, we will be working on it as early as December when hosting this meeting with the leaders of Africa.And then, the third topic is the development. Development--development projects, as we can see here at the World Bank, can apply to energy, education, food security, and health.We need the support of the main institutions, the World Bank, we also need Europe to mobilize as it did for Mali, and France will play its role.Let me add that the amount of the French aid for the Sahel through the French Development Agency, Aid Development Agency, is above €900 million. And for Mali itself, we committed, over a two-year period, to 280 million, including for food and health.The World Bank, just like France, has some requirements. The support that we can provide, the projects we can contribute to finance must meet all the criteria in terms of good governance and transparency. It is not in order to make it more difficult for the countries we support. It is to help them in their development.And I also would like to commend the responsibility of the leaders of Africa, including in the Sahel, where elections were held recently in Mali, and parliamentarian elections will also soon be held in Mali, because this goes hand in hand with development, and that can only help democracy. This is my purpose of my visit to the World Bank, in order to acknowledge the work done by the World Bank.The billion-euro amount announced by President Kim is definitely good news for the Region, and I'm sure it will put these funds to good use. In a few moments, I will be hosting at the Elysee Palace, President Kim, the head of the IMF, as well as the representative of the OECD, the WTO, and we'll be discussing economic matters, including the situation in France. I will confirm our strategy as well as my goal. This is based on three principles. The first one is to save as much money as we can on our budget without putting at risk or challenging the French social model in order to reduce our deficit. The second principle is to improve the competitiveness of the French economy in order to get back to the highest possible level of growth.And the third principle is to tackle unemployment by using any available tool, all the stakeholders, be they private or public, and that policy which is based on ongoing reforms that will continue is the only one that can guarantee the credibility. And as we can see, the interest rates remain very low on the markets, and it can also guarantee the national cohesion. So, this is what I meant to tell you on the occasion of this visit and your visit in a moment to the Elysee Palace. Thank you. Show Less -

Niger’s President: ‘Too Many Children Still Die, Too Many Mothers Die Giving Birth’NIAMEY, Niger, November 6, 2013 – Responding to Niger’s “Call to Action” for improvements in women’s reproductive hea... Show More +lth and girls’ education, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim pledged today to strongly support the initiative and to invest $200 million in a new regional project aimed at improving the regional response to maternal and reproductive health and adolescent girls’ issues.“Too many children still die, too many mothers are lost to complications of childbirth, and too few girls are in secondary school,” said Niger’s President Mahamadou Issoufou. “So we need to do much more.”During an historic trip to the region by leaders from five international organizations – the UN, World Bank, African Union, African Development Bank, and the European Union – Kim announced the $200 million Sahel Women’s Empowerment and Demographics Project. The initiative, which is additional to the Bank’s existing $150 million in commitments over the next two years for maternal and child health programs in the Sahel, will work across the region to improve the availability and affordability of reproductive health commodities, strengthen specialized training centers for rural based midwifery/nursing services, and to pilot and share knowledge on adolescent girls’ initiatives.While Niger and most of the countries in the Sahel have reduced child mortality significantly in recent years, maternal and child mortality levels remain high, as do fertility rates. If current trends continue, “my children’s generation will be three times as large as my generation,” said President Issoufou.“This call to action on Women's Empowerment and Demographics is not simply about numbers. It is about people. When women and girls have the tools to shape their own future, they will advance development for all,” said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.Financed by IDA, the World Bank Group’s fund for the poorest countries*, the new program will be closely coordinated with United Nations agencies and other development partners, and will build on existing investments and analyses of Africa’s demographic dividend already being supported by the World Bank Group.“As we work towards ending poverty across the developing world, we know that educating adolescent girls and getting health services to women will lead to greater prosperity not just for individual families but also for entire economies,” said World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim. “This link is even more critical when countries, such as those of the Sahel, have fast-growing youth populations and are trying to make timely investments to reap a major set of economic gains known as the demographic dividend.”Of the World Bank Group’s $350 million for the women’s empowerment and demographics program – including the $200 million pledge made today – up to $100 million is expected to go to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). Much of the funding to the UNFPA will be based on country requests for reproductive health commodities and services.“High fertility, rapid population growth and a large youth population present unique challenges in the Sahel. Where choices improve for women and girls, fertility declines and opportunities expand. Raising the age of marriage, keeping girls in school, enabling women through family planning to decide the spacing and number of their children, and investing in the health and education of young people, particularly young girls, can unlock a powerful demographic dividend and set countries in the Sahel on the path to sustained, inclusive social and economic growth. The time to act is now," said Babatunde Osotimehin, Executive Director of UNFPA and Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations.Speaking as both parent and president, President Issoufou highlighted the strong family values shared across the Sahel, and called for urgent coordinated regional action to ensure that children in Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, and Senegal have the best possible opportunities for the future.The heads of the World Bank Group and the United Nations are on their second joint mission to the continent, signaling their deep commitment to peace and economic development in Sub-Saharan Africa.* The World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA), established in 1960, helps the world’s poorest countries by providing zero-interest loans and grants for projects and programs that boost economic growth, reduce poverty, and improve poor people’s lives. IDA is one of the largest sources of assistance for the world’s 82 poorest countries, 40 of which are in Africa. Resources from IDA bring positive change for 2.5 billion people living on less than $2 a day. Since 1960, IDA has supported development work in 108 countries. Annual commitments have increased steadily and averaged about $16 billion over the last three years, with about 50 percent of commitments going to Africa. Show Less -

Upcoming Historic Visit, Led by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Spotlights Need to Link Peace Efforts with Economic DevelopmentBAMAKO, Mali, November 4, 2013--Signaling a renewed focus on boosting e... Show More +conomic growth and lifting people out of devastating poverty in Africa’s hard-hit Sahel region, two international development agencies announced major financial pledges: $1.5 billion from the World Bank Group in new regional investments over the next two years, in addition to significant country programs; and €5 billion ($6.75 billion) from the European Union to six countries in the region over the next seven years.The announcement comes on the eve of an historic trip to The Sahel by development leaders, led by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, to discuss peace, security, and resilience with the leaders of Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, and Chad. In addition to the UN’s Ban, others leaders making the trip are World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim; Andris Piebalgs, European Union Commissioner for Development; African Union Commission Chairperson Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma; and African Development Bank President Donald Kaberuka.The World Bank Group’s pledges for the next two years will support major regional development priorities such as social safety nets to help families weather the worst effects of economic adversity and natural disasters, improve infrastructure and create opportunities in rural areas.The World Bank Group’s funding, which is additional to its ongoing development multi-country and national programs in the region already worth several billion dollars, will create more hydropower and other sources of clean energy to greatly expand irrigation and transform agriculture; protect and expand pastoralism for more than 80 million people living in the Sahel who rely on it as a major source of food and livelihoods; expand health services for women and girls; and improve regional communications and connectivity between countries.It also includes $300 million from the IFC, the Bank Group’s private sector arm, which will support economic development in several countries in the Sahel. The inclusion of funding for private sector projects is aimed at attracting additional billions of dollars, which will be necessary in order to create good jobs and help bring stability to a region that has been rocked by conflict in the last two years. In addition, the Bank Group’s MIGA, which provides political risk insurance, will provide $585 million in guarantees over the next year for a gas project in Mauritania that exports power to Senegal and Mali.“The people of the Sahel region desperately need more secure living standards, and our hope is this funding helps build a new path for economic growth in the region,” said the World Bank Group’s Kim. “For too long, the people of the Sahel, especially women, have struggled with the devastating impact of too little economic growth and opportunity, a harsh climate, hunger, high fertility rates, and the world’s highest number of maternal and child deaths.”The European Union’s support to Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal and Chad (subject to approval by the European Parliament and the European Council) for the next seven years will aim to help those countries tackle the specific and complex challenges of the Sahel region: security and stability, development and resilience. Governance, rule of law and security, delivery of social services, agriculture and food security, as well as regional trade and integration will be at the heart of the development programmes over 2014-2020.“The Sahel is a priority for the European Union where it mobilizes all its instruments to address a complex situation,” said European Commissioner for Development Andris Piebalgs. “We are determined to continue and increase our support to both the States and people of the Sahel. Our approach is built on the principle that security is a pre-requisite for growth – there can be no development without it."The other leaders on the trip said that the Sahel region needs an infusion of development assistance in order to secure peace and prevent future conflicts.“The challenges in the Sahel respect no borders – neither should our solutions. The cycle of crises can be broken. By working together and investing in governance, security, resilience and opportunity for women and young people, we can help the Sahel move from fragility to sustainability. Fighting fires in the Sahel remains crucial; but we also need to clear away problems that ignite conflict and instability,” said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.“The Sahel faces old challenges, climate vulnerability and recurrent drought, now compounded by insecurity. We must now together build resilience and create opportunities for all through jobs especially for the young. For that we will invest in infrastructures, regional integration and support the private sector. The solution for the Sahel is inclusive economic growth, trade and investment. This is what will lay basis for lasting stability and sustainability,” said African Development Bank Group President, Dr. Donald Kaberuka.Added African Union Commission Chairperson Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma: “Our efforts to create peace and stability must be reinforced by investments in the peoples and countries of the Sahel region. If we connect communities and countries through infrastructure and market linkages, if we assist local farmers including women to deal with droughts and improve their agricultural outputs, if we invest in education and skills development for youth and children and if we build democratic, people-centered and inclusive political cultures and governance, we will create the conditions for lasting peace, prosperity and the renaissance of the Sahel.”For the UN’s Ban and World Bank’s Kim, this is the second trip in six months together to Africa. In May, the two travelled to the Great Lakes region, drawing attention to the same issue of promoting both peace and development. During that trip, Kim pledged $1 billion for regional projects for programs to improve health, education, nutrition, access to energy, and job training. Show Less -

“So does irrigation. Both affect farming, the dominant industry in the region, which accounts for one-third and more of all economic output in the Sahel. This in turn empowers the women of the Sahel, ... Show More +as women account for the majority of Africa’s farmers.”Pastoralism: Building Resilience for a Sustainable FuturePastoralism is the dominant economic activity in the Sahel, and pastoral communities have long suffered from the effects of droughts, flooding and social exclusion. Competition for water and grazing lands for crops and herds is growing and climate change is exacerbating the situation.The Sahel is home to some 16 million pastoralists. At the Nouakchott meeting held on October 29, participants agreed to adopt a regional approach to boost pastoralism and tackle many related issues such as trade, trans-boundary animal diseases, policy harmonization, early warning and rapid response systems, conflict, and peace building measures, all of which involve a cross-border dimension calling for ever-greater collaboration that stretches across borders.Diop joined President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz of Mauritania, President Idriss Déby of Chad, as well as regional Ministers of Agriculture, Rural and Community Development, senior business leaders, and representatives of producer organizations and civil society.More Irrigation Vital for Transforming Agriculture in the SahelThe Sahel is home to some of Africa’s largest aquifers, yet its water resources are under-utilized. Only 20% of the irrigation potential in Sahel countries is currently developed. Of this, one quarter of the area equipped for irrigation is in a state of disrepair, and many schemes receive public support for operation and maintenance or recurrent rehabilitation.In Dakar, on October 31, Diop joined President Macky Sall of Senegal, President Deby and government ministers from Sahelian countries, business leaders, and representatives of water user associations and civil society. A major outcome of the Dakar meeting was a strengthened resolve by all participating institutions to double the amount of irrigated land in the Sahel for increased incomes and greater prosperity.The commitments and resolve are reflected in two declarations issued in Nouakchott and Dakar. Show Less -

OUAGADOUGOU, October 31, 2013 – The World Bank will help the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to improve the region’s disease surveillance and response system across 15 member countr... Show More +ies with a new grant of US$10 million through the Africa Catalytic Growth Fund.In 2008-2009, 14 of the 15 ECOWAS countries experienced at least one outbreak of meningitis, and half experienced two outbreaks. The number of meningitis cases tripled during this period. The project will build the capacity to identify outbreaks at an early stage and take action at both the local and regional levels.“Disease outbreaks take a heavy toll across West Africa, spreading across borders and putting millions of lives and livelihoods at risk,” said Trina S. Haque, Sector Manager for World Bank Health, Nutrition and Population in West and Central Africa. “Reporting and containing these outbreaks will help people in disease-prone areas to protect themselves and their children from diseases that can be deeply debilitating, or even fatal.”To be implemented by the West African Health Organization, the project will help countries to establish or upgrade their disease surveillance capacity and adopt the Integrated Disease Surveillance and Response Strategy laid down by the World Health Organization and the Africa Regional Office (WHO/AFRO).The West Africa Regional Disease Surveillance Capacity Strengthening Project will train laboratory workers and other health staff to use a common framework to report and respond to the first signs of deadly diseases like meningitis, yellow fever, Lassa fever, cholera, polio, measles and dengue in their districts.The project will also offer Masters-level training in disease surveillance for district health staff, and on-the-job training in laboratory techniques and disease surveillance for health workers at the frontline.“Through this grant, we are helping to build the foundation of an efficient multi-country disease surveillance system that we hope will be developed much beyond the four-year term of this project and supported by more partners in future,” said Enias Baganizi, Senior Health Specialist at the World Bank and Task Team Leader for the Project.“The persistence of outbreaks and epidemics in our region is an unacceptable reminder that inadequacies still exist in the capacity of our member countries’ public health system” said Dr. Placido Cardoso, Director-General of the West African Health Organization. “This new partnership with the World Bank represents our unwavering regional commitment to controlling major diseases and improving health outcomes.” Show Less -

This economy profile presents the Doing
Business indicators for Senegal. In a series of annual
reports, Doing Business assesses regulations affecting
domestic firms... Show More + in 189 economies and ranks the economies in
10 areas of business regulation, such as starting a
business, resolving insolvency and trading across borders.
This year's report data cover regulations measured from
June 2012 through May 2013. The report is the 11th edition
of the Doing Business series. Show Less -

The Sahel region, a vast arid stretch of land linking six countries in West Africa -- Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and Senegal -- is home to some of the most productive pastoralist comm... Show More +unities in the world. And yet, assailed by a host of climatic, political and development challenges, their pastoralist way of life is under threat.Here, over centuries, some 16 million pastoralists have perfected the art of survival in the Sahel, raising sheep and livestock in some of the most harsh and unforgiving environments anywhere on the planet. Meat yields from the Sahel rival those from some of the best ranches in Australia and the United States. Currently, half of the meat and two-thirds of the milk produced and consumed in the countries of West Africa originates in the Sahel.However pastoralism is facing multiple threats. These include rapid population growth, conflict, volatile food prices, animal diseases, and shrinking grazing areas and water resources. Combined, these factors are steadily jeopardizing the survival of the pastoralists of the Sahel. Climate change is expected to hit Africa hardest. It is increasingly likely that scientific warnings that the world could warm by 2°C in the next 20 or 30 years will come true. In such a case, pastoralism will be imperiled. The effects on the African continent will be dramatically more devastating under a warming scenario of 4°C.Desert and aridity define the Sahel, yet its vast water resources are untapped. In a region where farming is the predominant economic activity, sadly, only 20 percent of the Sahel’s irrigation potential has been developed. Worse still, one quarter of the area equipped with irrigation lies in a state of disrepair.Pastoralism matters for Africa’s future particularly in the Sahel. So does irrigation. Both affect farming, the dominant industry in the region, which accounts for one-third and more of all economic output in the Sahel. This in turn empowers the women of the Sahel, as women account for the majority of Africa’s farmers. Supporting pastoralism with more climate smart-policies; reducing vulnerability to drought, flooding and other disasters; and raising more healthy livestock through timely vaccines, are all necessary to help communities adapt to the ecological harshness of the Sahel. Bringing more water to parched lands in the Sahel will not only improve food production but place more food on family dinner tables, allow farmers to move from subsistence farming into growing and selling greater quantities of food crops for higher earnings in local and regional markets. Climate-smart agriculture can increase yields, put more money in farmers’ pockets and help protect biodiversity, improve soil fertility, and conserve the environment.At a time when the global economy is slowly recovering, we want to prime the engines of growth that really matter. The World Bank is hosting two major summits in Mauritania and Senegal focused on threats and opportunities for pastoralism and irrigation to thrive in Africa. I am confident that in Nouakchott and Dakar, we will mobilize new coalitions of countries, development partners, business leaders, and the communities themselves for a new push to transform agriculture with more domestic, regional and international support for pastoralism and irrigation. It can be done.Makhtar Diop is the World Bank Group’s Vice President for Africa Show Less -

WASHINGTON, October 27, 2013– On the eve of two major agriculture summits in Mauritania and Senegal, the World Bank is urging African countries and communities in the Sahel and the international devel... Show More +opment community to help protect and expand pastoralism on behalf of the more than 80 million people living in The Sahel who rely on it as a major source of food and livelihoods. The Bank is also calling for more large-scale irrigation to help the region to move towards embracing climate smart agriculture that can manage competing demands for land, water, and other natural resources, in a region that has long suffered from drought, hunger, and low economic growthIn background papers released in preparation for the two summits, the Bank says that more than 50 percent of the meat and the milk which people consume in West African coastal countries come originally from the Sahel.The two summits on improving pastoralism and boosting irrigation in the Sahel, which are being organized by the World Bank and its development partners, will be held in Nouakchott and Dakar respectively on October 29 and October 31, 2013. High-level participants will include President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz of Mauritania, President Idriss Déby of Chad, as well as regional Ministers of Agriculture, Rural and Community Development, senior business leaders, and representatives of producer organizations and civil society.“African agriculture employs a massive 65-70 percent of the continent’s labor force and typically accounts for 30-40 percent of GDP. It represents the single most important industry in the region, and therefore its transformation and growth is vital to reduce poverty in a region like The Sahel and avoid humanitarian crises that have all too frequently plague the region,” says Makhtar Diop, World Bank’s Vice President for Africa Region, who will open the Pastoralism Forum in Nouakchott, the Mauritanian capital on October 29th. “Addressing the challenge of agriculture in the Sahel is an opportunity to redress past economic imbalances and position the region to become a player in addressing the global increase in food demand.” Diop says boosting investment in the Sahel will help to significantly improve living standards for people and reduce the frequency and severity of food crisesAccording to the Bank, Africa is home to some 50 million pastoralists with some 16 million of them living in The Sahel and in extreme poverty. The vulnerability of pastoral communities to drought, flooding, and other disasters remains unduly high in Sahelian countries and is made worse by their historic social exclusion and increasing competition for access to water and grazing lands for their herds and crops. Given that The Sahel will continue to be one of the world’s regions most seriously affected by climate change, drought and other weather extremes are likely to increase the pressures on pastoralism to survive as a way of life and livelihoods. “We urgently need to mobilize more investment to support pastoral systems in the arid lands of The Sahel in order to reduce the vulnerability of communities to poverty and hunger while building up their resilience to weather adversity, and promoting more social cohesion and security in the wider region to prevent new conflicts from arising,” says Jamal Saghir, the World Bank’s Director for Sustainable Development in Africa. Saghir says that a regional approach to boosting pastoralism is essential since many issues such as trade, trans-boundary animal diseases, policy harmonization, early warning and rapid response systems, conflict, and peace building measures, all involve a cross-border dimension. More irrigated land also vital for transforming agriculture In addition to promoting and expanding pastoralism, irrigating more land is also vital to produce more food, create jobs, reduce poverty, and improve the lives of people throughout The Sahel. . Although the region is blessed with some of Africa’s largest aquifers, for the most part they are under-used and many countries lack the scientific data and infrastructure to tap into and manage these water reserves sustainably. On top of that, only 20 percent of the irrigation potential in Sahelian countries is currently developed, and many existing irrigation systems need to be repaired. “The Niger, Senegal, Lake Chad, and Volta River basins have tremendous undeveloped irrigation, fisheries, transport and hydroelectric potential. So my colleagues and I in the World Bank want to improve this situation so that the famers and families of the Sahel can take advantage of rising demand for food, meat and dairy products. More water in The Sahel means more development in the form of food, more jobs, more money and opportunity, especially for young people, and women in particular as farmers and traders,” says World Bank Africa Vice President Diop. The High Level Forum on Irrigation, which will be held on October 31st in Dakar, Senegal, will build on the Ouagadougou Call for Action and highlight success stories and strategies that could be scaled up or replicated, like the Great Green Wall, or inclusive agribusiness projects based on irrigation development in Senegal and Burkina Faso. High-level participants at the Dakar irrigation summit will include President Macky Sall of Senegal, Government Ministers from Sahelian countries, business leaders, and representatives of water user associations and civil society. Show Less -

WASHINGTON, October 15, 2013 – The World Bank today signed a US$4.6 million grant agreement to establish a regional innovation hub for the World Bank Sahel and West Africa Program (SAWAP) that support... Show More +s the Great Green Wall -- an African initiative that promotes sustainable land use practices across vulnerable dryland countries.The new project dubbed BRICKS -- Building Resilience through Innovation, Communication and Knowledge Services – will provide operational, technical and knowledge services to 12 countries under SAWAP that are implementing or preparing large-scale investment operations. These countries include Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, Ethiopia, Ghana, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sudan and Togo.The grant is funded by the Global Environment Facility, and the agreements were signed in Washington by Colin Bruce, World Bank Director for Strategy and Operations in the Africa Region, and the leaders of the three implementing agencies that will implement the BRICKS project: Djimé Adoum, Executive Secretary of the Interstate Committee for Drought Control in the Sahel (CILSS); Khatim Kherraz, Executive Secretary of the Sahara and Sahel Observatory (OSS); and Aimé Nianogo, Director of the West and Central Africa Office of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN/PACO).“The BRICKS project is a strategic effort designed to boost resilience in the Sahel and help countries and communities adapt to the challenges posed by a changing climate and rapidly degrading natural resource base,” said Jamal Saghir, World Bank Director for Sustainable Development in the Africa Region. “It marks a major step forward for effective implementation of the World Bank and U.N. joint Sahel initiative for securing stability, peace and sustainable development.” The overall aim is to enhance the resilience of landscapes and livelihoods and in doing so, contribute to poverty reduction, food and water security and curb natural resource degradation. Six of SAWAP’s 12 country investment operations have already been approved by the Board of Executive Directors of the World Bank, and the remaining projects are planned to be delivered within the next six months. The BRICKS project underpins a portfolio over US$1 billion. “The GEF is delighted to help countries of the Sahel and West Africa region move forward with the Great Green Wall Initiative,” said Naoko Ishii, GEF CEO. “This is a key contribution from the GEF to the commitment to transformational change in the drylands. “The BRICKS project will support a regional platform to ensure coherence in approaches toward sustainable land management in the region. And the participation of CILSS, OSS, and IUCN will strenghen the opportunity for involving civil society and grassroots organizations in the overall program.”The Great Green Wall initiative was launched by African Heads of State in 2007 and has evolved into a regional vision of sustainable landscapes that generate multiple economic and environmental benefits and help build the resilience of the Sahel, where over half the population lives on less than $1.25 per day, and nearly 70 percent depend on the economic services provided by land resources.“Sahelian countries face a complex set of development challenges. Flat economic growth, rising population, and rapid natural resource degradation are now increasingly affected by climate change,” said Dr. Adoum. “Through projects such as BRICKS we aim to build capacities of African institutions, strengthen country project implementation and secure robust development gains that not only help reduce poverty but also build the resilience and coping capacities of poor communities living in ecologically fragile, harsh environments.” “BRICKS will catalyze South-South cooperation, marshal evidence for informed decision-making, and draw upon and connect the expertise of diverse communities of practice working in different sectors,” said Stephen Danyo, Project Leader and World Bank Senior Natural Resource Management Specialist in the Africa Region. “We look forward to speedy project implementation in keeping with our mandate to provide cutting-edge knowledge solutions that benefit the people living in the region.” Through BRICKS, the CILSS, OSS and IUCN will convene and deliver operational services to the 12 country-led large-scale investment operations in the SAWAP portfolio, focusing on south-south learning on such topics as environmental change monitoring, geospatial analyses, strategic communication, biodiversity planning, and dissemination of best practices on land use planning and management.BRICKS will also serve as an interface with other international partners that the Bank has engaged with as part of the TerrAfrica partnership and who are supporting the Great Green Wall, including the African Union Commission, Food and Agriculture Organization of the U.N., and the Global Mechanism of the U.N. Convention to Combat Desertification – all of whom were involved in the preparation of BRICKS to ensure strategic complementarities and to capture synergies. Show Less -

An Innovative StrategyThe National Economic and Social Development Strategy (NESDS), developed in end-2012, aims precisely to reverse this negative trend by increasing the productivity of the ent... Show More +ire Senegalese economy, in both the public and private sectors (sectors where performance is lower than the country's past performance as well as that of other African countries), and by improving citizens' living conditions.Over the past months, Ms. Songwe and her team developed an innovative strategy to assist Senegalese authorities with designing a detailed matrix of the key outcomes defined in the NESDS and the World Bank Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) with Senegal for the 2013-2017 period.This experimental approach applies to the following sectors: energy/electricity, higher education, governance/civil service, urban flooding, disaster management, investment climate reform, and social protection.In concrete terms, this matrix clearly defines the conditions to be met and the key steps required to achieve the outcomes targeted by the NESDS and the CPS. For example, to reduce the cost of electricity production from CFAF 94.31 in 2012 (among the highest prices in Africa) to CFAF 63.15 in 2015, the quarterly objectives to be achieved and the budget allocated were identified. Similarly, with respect to combating the recurring flooding that has claimed numerous victims, the matrix defines quarterly steps and the necessary budgetary allocations to provide security for 7,000 persons in 2013 and 98,000 persons in 2017 under theStormwater Management and Climate Change Adaptation Project (PROGEP).According to Vera Songwe, this approach is unique in more ways than one: it offers the opportunity for close collaboration between the World Bank and the ministries and implementing entities; the outcomes defined in the NESDS and CPS are linked to a budget or to specific resources, whether from the Senegalese Government, the World Bank, or both. “For each outcome targeted, the matrix clearly defines the objectives to be met and the activities to be carried out, based on a very precise timetable, which allows progress to be measured and ensures transparency,” she said.This perspective is shared by Amacodou Diouf, chair of the National Civil Society Consortium (CONGAD), a civil society representative. “It is an excellent exercise that should allow us, on one hand, to take stock of our strengths and weaknesses and on the other hand, to see how to improve our performance with a view to best meeting the needs of citizens,” he stated. Show Less -

Six countries form Global Network of Delivery Leaders; ‘You need to deliver on your programs,’ says one leaderUNITED NATIONS, October 3, 2013 -- Political leaders from six countries today announced th... Show More +ey were forming an unusual network to share knowledge about what works -- and what doesn’t -- in delivering government services to citizens. The countries -- Albania, Ethiopia, Ghana, Haiti, Malawi, and Senegal -- decided to start this joint effort after meeting on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly last week.The countries, while facing a wide variety of issues, share a common desire to improve the delivery of services, ranging from improving education in classrooms to increasing vaccination rates of children to building bridges.The group, called the Global Network of Delivery Leaders, was formed following a meeting with World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair. The leaders met with Kim and Blair during the Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting. The World Bank Group and the Office of Tony Blair will provide technical support to the network and its members. Details are still being worked out with the countries.“I believe delivery is at the core of governance,” said President John Mahama of Ghana. “We can come out with beautiful policies, but policies alone will not do the job. In order to succeed as a leader, you need to deliver on your programs.”All six leaders said they would encourage other countries to join their network focusing on delivery leadership.They said the burden should be on elected leaders to deliver more effective programs, but that the transition from running a campaign to running a government was not a simple one. In order to run effective programs, they said, they needed to build up expertise in their offices and gain access to best practices around the world to help them deliver on their promises.“In health or education programs, or even in building a bridge, we don’t need to repeat something that hasn’t worked somewhere else,” said Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn. “We have to focus on getting things done and demonstrating leadership by focusing on delivery as a critical part of our job.”Several of the leaders said the process of improving delivery would not come easily.“There is resistance in bureaucracies to implement change,” said Haiti’s Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe. “We have examples of middle managers in government who sit on projects for two or three months or more. There is a culture of inaction. We need to make it very clear as leaders that we need our bureaucracies to implement our programs efficiently and successfully.”Lamothe said he has set up a system in which managers will receive a couple of emails a week reminding them about project deadlines. He said it has unlocked several bottlenecks.Some of the countries have already created delivery units, which monitor whether priority programs are working as designed. The other countries are now exploring whether to establish a delivery unit as well.Joyce Banda, the president of Malawi, said she has set up an Implementation Unit in her office after holding a National Dialogue on the Economy, which led to the government setting priorities over the next two years. “What’s critically important in Malawi is strengthening our governance institutions,” she said. “We have to make sure those institutions are strong enough in order for us to deliver on our promises.”President Mahama of Ghana said his office also was beginning to establish a Delivery Unit, which will report directly to him. “We intend to ruthlessly prioritize, and ensure reforms are translated into noticeable results,” he said.Getting delivery right sometimes was complicated by donors’ demands, some leaders said.Senegalese President Macky Sall called on donors to simplify and harmonize their processes and procedures, including procurement rules. He said his country has to deal with different procedures from 50 donors, which does not help with effective delivery.He also said that Senegal, like many African countries, could use help in “developing more public-private partnerships, and improving the investment climate.”But ultimately, delivery takes political leaders’ personal conviction and commitment.Albania’s Prime Minister Edi Rama, who took office just three weeks ago, said he was interested in setting up a delivery unit that would collect and analyze data each day, but also would conduct ongoing research to determine what was working and what wasn’t. He said one possible area of focus for a delivery unit in Albania was to enhance the absorption capacity of the country and to tackle key challenges like energy.“I strongly believe that getting this right means you need a combination of the rational and the inspirational,” Rama said. “The rational is making sure you set up an effective delivery system, and be on top of collecting information, analyzing it, and then putting it to use. The inspirational part is making the case of why this is really important: doing delivery well means improving education, health care, and all government services for people.”Inspiration is a part of making delivery work, he said. Leaders need to communicate the importance of delivery to their ministries. “You need to really inspire people. You need to give them a purpose,” he said. “Then you need to set up a rational collection of information and make sure the information, or the evidence, helps to improve delivery.”The World Bank’s Kim said he was inspired by the determination of the six leaders to make delivery a priority.“Often, people think that if you have a good policy, you are done, that’s it. But these six leaders, and many others, know differently,” Kim said. “Delivery is difficult. But if leaders get delivery right, they will make a major impact on people’s lives. We need to help create a network that will capture both successes and failures in delivery, and make that information instantly available to country leaders. When that happens, children will learn more in schools, mothers will receive better health care, and cities will build more effective public transportation systems, among many other things.”Blair agreed with Kim and said that leaders need to turn their visions into reality, “and this is perhaps the greatest challenge for the new leaders of today. How do you govern effectively? How do you get the right policy? How do you get it implemented and make sure you get the right results?”He continued: “It’s why the Global Network of Delivery Leaders can be transformative. We’ll bring together political leaders to share experience, and to learn about building effective government and successful implementation. We’ll equip people with those skills they need to really make a difference.” Show Less -

WASHINGTON, September 25, 2013 – The World Bank Board of Directors today approved an IDA* credit of $US40 million to support Senegal’s efforts to boost the productivity of rice, mangoes, and other cro... Show More +ps, create jobs for youth and female farmers and rehabilitate roads that link isolated rural communities with markets in the country’s war-torn Casamance region.“Senegal’s newly elected Government attaches high priority to resolving the long-standing conflict in Casamance,” says Vera Songwe, the World Bank Country Director for Senegal. “Today’s project goes a long way towards helping to bring peace to the region by boosting the local economy, creating much-needed jobs for vulnerable youth and women and improving access to agricultural markets.”Today’s funds support Senegal’s Casamance Development Pole Project designed to create economic opportunities and support the reintegration of ex-combatants in Casamance region. The project’s first segment will support building infrastructure and purchasing equipment to enable growers and others to collect, handle, process and transport local produce. It will support the Integrated Economic Platform of Bignona, an ongoing program helping to improve the region’s ability to manufacture and export value added products, such as jams and dried fruit, from local produce.“Insufficient rain and a lack of access to fertilizers and seeds slowed the growth of Senegal’s agriculture sector and created a serious food crisis in 2011,” says Jamal Saghir, the World Bank Director for Sustainable Development with the Africa Region. “Today’s project will help boost the production of rice and other staples of the Senegalese diet facilitate the export of produce from Casamance to other parts of the country and bring much-needed income to farm families.” The project’s second component will link isolated rural communities with markets, production centers and cities. Specifically the project will fund spot improvements on about 350 km of unclassified roads and the rehabilitation and maintenance of about 200 km of selected rural roads.The third part of today’s financing will support capacity building of key stakeholders, including the Agence Nationale pour la Relance des Activités Economiques et Sociales en Casamance (ANRAC), and their ability to carry out peace building processes and programs focused on the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration for ex-combatants. “For the past 30 years the Casamance region has experienced Africa’s longest lived low-intensity conflict, which has stifled agriculture, trade and tourism, and killed and injured hundreds of people,” says Demba Balde. World Bank Task Team Leader for the project. “I look forward to helping the Senegal Government implement today’s project.”* The World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA), established in 1960, helps the world’s poorest countries by providing loans (called “credits”) and grants for projects and programs that boost economic growth, reduce poverty, and improve poor people’s lives. IDA is one of the largest sources of assistance for the world’s 82 poorest countries, 40 of which are in Africa. Resources from IDA bring positive change for 2.5 billion people living on less than $2 a day. Since 1960, IDA has supported development work in 108 countries. Annual commitments have increased steadily and averaged about $15 billion over the last three years, with about 50 percent of commitments going to Africa. Show Less -

This brief summarizes the results of a
gender impact evaluation study, entitled Almost random :
evaluating a large-scale randomized nutrition program in the
presenc... Show More +e of crossover, conducted in 2002 in Senegal. The
study observed the impact of the nutrition enhancement
program, which aims to improve child nutrition in Senegal
based on a large-scale randomized community intervention on
the individual level. The intervention increases weight for
age by 0.1 standard deviations. Parent's education
improves the nutrition status, and the results do not differ
between genders. There was a reduction of giving non-breast
milk liquids to infants of 11 percent in the treatment
group. After controlling for observable characteristics,
there is about 0.27 standard deviation increase in
weight-for-age score. Show Less -

This brief summarizes the results of a
gender impact evaluation study, entitled Does community
driven development work? Evidence from Senegal, conducted
between 200... Show More +3 and 2005, in Senegal. The study observed that
using a variety of estimation procedures, including
instrumental variables, and working at different levels of
aggregation, we find statistically significant and
quantitatively important effects of the program on access by
villagers to clean water and health services, as well as on
standard measures of child malnutrition. The program
increases per capita household expenditures by 65 percent.
The program significantly improves access to clean water and
health facilities. The program also significantly reduces
the prevalence of underweight and stunted children and
significantly increased household expenditure per capita and
nutrition of children. The number of female villagers on the
council is increasing with the likelihood of a village
receiving a completed project. Funding for the study derived
from the World Bank. Show Less -

This brief summarizes the results of a
gender impact evaluation study, entitled Human
immunodeficiency virus (HIV) or acquired immunodeficiency
syndrome (AIDS) sens... Show More +itization and peer-mentoring : evidence
from a randomized experiment in Senegal, conducted between
January and March 2009 in Senegal. The study observed the
impact of funding community based organizations in
increasing voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) adoption
and modifying the subsequent behavior of HIV-positive
individuals on the district level. Funded peer-mentoring
doubles the number of individuals who get tested, follow
pre-test counseling and pick up their test results.
Traditional sensitization and peer mentoring do not have an
impact on the number of individuals who test positive or
pick up their results. Funded traditional sensitization and
peer mentoring increase the number of partners of HIV
positive individuals who get tested. Both peer mentoring and
traditional sensitization significantly increase the number
of HIV positive individuals who follow post-test counseling.
In terms of changing the behavior of HIV-positive
individuals, both traditional social mobilization and
peer-mentoring are effective, with traditional social
mobilization being much more so in terms of ensuring that
partners of infected men are tested and infected women
follow post-test counseling, while peer-mentoring is
effective at encouraging infected men to follow post-test
counseling. Funding for the study derived from the
Senegalese government, Global HIV or AIDS Program, Joint
United Nations Programme on HIV or AIDS (UNAIDS), and World Bank. Show Less -

The African coastal countries are facing
several environmental and socio-economic challenges, such as
unplanned urban and economic development, fueled by a
growing ... Show More +rural exodus; non-functional or non-existent public
infrastructures to handle the demographic growth along the
coastline; air, water and soil pollution; and alteration of
coastal ecosystems. West Africa, in particular, is facing
severe land losses and major damage due to coastal erosion
and shoreline loss. This situation impacts coastal
communities, infrastructures and users, and hampers economic
growth. The institutional, technical and financial
capabilities at the regional, national and local scales are
not sufficient to effectively meet these challenges. The
impacts of climate change intensify these trends and induce
accelerated coastal erosion, loss of land and assets, river
or run-off floods, marine submersion, groundwater
salinization and changes in the distribution and abundance
of coastal and marine habitats and species. The World Bank,
supported by the governments of Norway and Finland, assists
the Senegalese government in developing reforms program, in
improving the country's technical and financial
adaptability and in integrating climate resilience into the
future development plans regarding the coastline of Senegal.
The aim of this study is to carry out a spatial and economic
analysis of the coastal areas' vulnerability to climate
change and natural risks in Senegal, and to perform an
economic analysis of different adaptation options in three
pilot sites. Show Less -

WASHINGTON, July 25, 2013 - The World Bank Group committed a record US$14.7 billion in fiscal year 2013 (July 2012 to June 2013) to support economic growth and better development prospects in Africa d... Show More +espite uncertain economic conditions in the rest of the global economy.“The region has shown remarkable resilience in the face of a global recession and continues to grow strongly,” said Makhtar Diop, World Bank Vice President for the Africa Region. “Africa is at the center of the World Bank Group 2030 goals of ending extreme poverty and promoting shared prosperity, in an environmentally, socially, and fiscally sustainable manner.”The World Bank Group continued its strong commitment to Africa approving $8.25 billion in new lendng for nearly 100 projects this fiscal year (FY13). These commitments include a record $8.2 billion in zero-interest credits and grants from the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s fund for the poorest countries. This is the highest level of new IDA commitments by any region in the Bank’s history. Private sector leverages development investment IFC’s total commitment volume in Sub-Saharan Africa, including mobilization, grew to a record $5.3 billion, 34 percent more than the year before. Similarly, IFC’s spending on Advisory Services programs in the region increased to more than $65 million, about 30 percent of IFC’s total. This led to increased results in fragile and conflict states and greater impact in IFC’s primary areas of focus: sustainable farming opportunities, access to finance for microfinance clients and individuals, improved infrastructure services, and greenhouse gas emissions reductions.﻿Supporting developmentally beneficial foreign direct investment into Sub-Saharan Africa is a priority for MIGA. In 2013, the Agency issued $1.5 billion in guarantees supporting investments into projects in the agribusiness, oil and gas, power, services, and water sectors. A significant volume of this coverage is for investments in power generation projects in Angola, Côte d’Ivoire, and Kenya. Sub-Saharan African accounted for 54 percent of MIGA’s new volume this year -- more than doubling last year’s level of 24 percent.The Bank Group’s support focused on major transformational projects in agriculture and power, and also on social safety nets, conditional cash transfers for poor families, job creation programs for young people, and higher education. Stepping Up the Game in Fragile CountriesIn FY13, the World Bank Group increased its focus in Africa on regional drivers of fragility and conflict, especially regarding the Sahel and the Great Lakes regions. In May 2013, during an historic joint United Nations/World Bank Group mission to the Great Lakes, the Bank announced a $1 billion development pledge to help countries in the region provide better health and education services, generate more cross-border trade, and fund hydroelectricity projects in support of the Great Lakes peace agreement. Sending the strong message that peace and development are inseparable and must be addressed together and also emphasizing the Bank’s commitment to increase its work in states emerging from conflict and its determination to help lift fragile states out of fragility and back on a positive development track. Addressing Climate ChangeThe Bank has been at the forefront of identifying operational measures and partnerships (such as TerrAfrica) to integrate climate change in land management, water resource management, transport infrastructure, climate-smart agriculture, and disaster risk management and continues to advance innovative policy solutions, including through the first climate change Development Policy Loan, for Mozambique.Climate change is also at the center of the growth agenda of the Region. Clean energy projects -- in hydro, geothermal, solar, and gas -- are part of the Bank’s Africa strategy to limit the carbon footprint of growth in the region and harvest enormous untapped potential for development. Many of these current and planned projects benefit from IDA, MIGA, and IFC working together across the World Bank Group to better leverage their development investments in the region. Accelerating the Use of Science and TechnologyAfrica’s future depends on adapting existing and future technology more rapidly. Large productivity gains are possible through better training of Africans in science and technology, and enhanced agricultural technology. During FY13 the Bank helped to bring higher education, with an emphasis on science, back into the development agenda. African economies urgently need highly skilled technicians and engineers, especially for energy and infrastructure. They need agricultural scientists; medical workers; and researchers. Quality learning outcomes in primary and secondary education require qualified teachers that only universities can develop. The Bank continued to build partnerships to support technological education. For more information about the World Bank Group's total support to developing countries in FY13 click here. Show Less -

The indicators, which were piloted in
Senegal, provide a set of metrics to benchmark the
performance of schools and health clinics in Africa. The
indicators can be ... Show More +used to track progress within and across
countries over time, and aim to enhance active monitoring of
service delivery to increase public accountability and good
governance. The service delivery indicators project takes as
its starting point the literature on how to boost education
and health outcomes in developing countries. This literature
shows robust evidence that the type of individuals attracted
to specific tasks at different levels of the service
delivery hierarchy, as well as the set of incentives they
face to actually exert effort, are positively and
significantly related to education and health outcomes. To
evaluate the feasibility of the indicators, pilot surveys in
primary education and health care were implemented in
Senegal in 2010. The results from the pilot studies
demonstrate that the indicators methodology is capable of
providing the necessary information to construct harmonized
indicators on the quality of service delivery, as
experienced by the citizen, using a single set of
instruments at a single point of collection. This paper is
structured as follows: section one gives introduction.
Section two outlines the analytical underpinnings of the
indicators and how they are categorized. Section three
presents the methodology of the pilot surveys in Senegal.
The results from the pilot are presented and analyzed in
section four. Section five presents results on education
outcomes, as evidenced by student test scores. Section six
discusses the advantages and disadvantages of collapsing the
indicators into one score or index, and provides a method
for doing so in case such an index is deemed appropriate.
Section seven discusses lessons learned, trade-offs, and
options for scaling up the project. Show Less -